If Matt Cain and Tim Lincecum had to throw purely fastballs, I’d wager Cain would give up fewer hits and put up better numbers. His fastball has that rare gift – late movement and explosion.

Life, they call it.

Well, life hasn’t always been kind to Cain on the mound. A lot has been written and said about his misfortune. We all know about his bad luck and poor run support over the past two seasons. We also know he’s one of the most talented pitchers in the major leagues.

This spring, Cain seemed to be talking differently about his plight. He wasn’t shrugging his shoulders anymore. He pledged to focus a little harder, do more in between starts to physically condition himself, and be in position to go a little deeper in games. That way, he doesn’t give up that run in the seventh inning of a 2-1 loss. Or he soaks up three more outs before the bullpen is charged with protecting his one-run lead.

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Sunday night, I think we got a glimpse of what Cain had hoped to change this season. Yes, he threw 50 pitches in the first two innings. Yes, he walked the bases loaded. (In fairness to Cain, it should be noted that two of them were battles. David Wright fouled off three two-strike pitches and Omir Santos fouled off two with two strikes.)

The key is that Cain made pitches to keep the Mets not only from breaking the game open, but off the board entirely. I thought he’d be lucky to get through the fifth inning. He did, and regrouped well enough to convince Manager Bruce Bochy to send him out for the sixth despite 104 pitches. He needed just 10 more pitches to soak up those three outs.

All told, it’s no coincidence that Cain won on a night the offense scored just a single run for him. (Cain drove in the other one himself, don’t forget.)

“Matt had great stuff,” Bochy said. “He had trouble commanding it, but he’s keeping his composure and making pitches. To be honest, I didn’t think we’d get six out of him after the first two. But he can log pitches. He’s a horse.”

That seems to be the animal of choice when you ask a player or coach to describe Cain.

“His stuff doesn’t seem to get worse late in the game,” Affeldt said. “He probably could’ve kept going out there longer. He doesn’t panic. When you need innings, he’ll give them to you. That’s what your horse does for you.”

I’ve tried to muster up support to nickname Cain the “Tennessee Stud,” as a nod to his home state and the Johnny Cash tune. Seems appropriate to throw out the idea again. (The horse in the song even has eyes of green. I’m pretty sure Cain’s are, too.)

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I usually don’t jot down quotes that merely restate the obvious. But asking Cain about his takeout slide in the sixth, he replied with the following, which seemed to have a Yogi-like element to it:

“Once you’re on the bases, you’re a baserunner,” Cain said. “That’s one of the themes we harp on.”

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You might miss it lodged far down in the game story, but yes, that was Jonathan Sanchez warming up in the sixth inning. It was just a precaution, said Bochy, because the bullpen had been stretched. (No significant ailments among the relievers, Bochy said. Everyone is expected to be available Tuesday in San Diego.)

Sanchez will start when his turn falls on Wednesday, Bochy said. No changes to the rotation. So Randy Johnson still draws Friday’s series opener at Seattle and Tim Lincecum still becomes a spectator during the weekend visit to his hometown.

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It’s still hard to believe the Padres swept the Giants in a three-game series at Petco Park in early April. Even if they played in the PCL, it’d be hard to imagine the Padres sweeping anyone.

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The Giants will get Chris Young, Chad Gaudin and Kevin Correia. No Jake Peavy. It’ll be Barry Zito, Sanchez and Tim Lincecum for the Giants.

Correia is fired up to face the Giants. I’d imagine he’s not fired up to oppose Lincecum.

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One other item from the game story that you might miss: There was talk on the Mets side that Cain was tipping his offspeed pitches by lifting his leg differently. It didn’t seem to help them, although Cain admitted the 5:09 p.m. start time was a boon for the pitchers.

“I had to hit, too, and it was tough to see,” he said.

Cain was surprised at the pitch tipping talk. He said he intentionally varies his looks with runners on base, but he’d check the video to see if there’s anything he needs to address.

I’ve got to believe there’s some truth to the Mets’ talk because it’s obvious their advance scout did an outstanding job on the Giants. They were advised to steal everything but the Lou Seals in the build-a-bear tent, and they followed the plan to perfection. The Mets set a franchise record with 13 stolen bases over a three-game span (in 14 attempts).

On Sunday, though, they didn’t steal once. David Wright, who had four steals on Thursday, was caught in their only attempt. And Bochy made it clear the problem stemmed from the mound, not catcher Bengie Molina.

“We showed today if he gets a chance to throw somebody out, he’ll throw them out,” Bochy said. “This team ran wild on us. We know it and we’ll address it. When Bengie gets a chance, he throws as well as anybody.”
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I’ve heard it said many, many times that a pitcher is “battling himself on the mound,” but I haven’t seen anything like what struck Mike Pelfrey. The Mets right-hander became the first major league pitcher in 15 years to balk three times in a game. (Al Leiter was the last one, in 1994.)

The first time, Pelfrey just caught a spike and had to stop his motion. The second time, he rocked toward the plate before he stepped off. I guess he told Mets reporters that he just felt a strong compulsion to throw to first base, almost an OCD thing, and couldn’t bury it.

Golfers call it the “yips.” I know I’ve gotten those while standing over a 2-foot putt. Hey, there’s a lot of pressure when you need to sink it to save an eight.

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Jon Miller got to stay home for “Sunday Night Baseball” on ESPN. If you saw the game, you might have been blinded by his yellow shirt-yellow tie combination. Hmmmm, that guy looks familiar. I know I’ve seen him someplace…

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Middle relievers always get short shrift when they contribute to a win, but Jeremy Affeldt’s pitching in this series shouldn’t go unnoticed. After Bob Howry walked the leadoff hitter in the eighth, Affeldt gave up a double to red-hot Carlos Beltran to put the tying runs in scoring position. But Affeldt struck out Gary Sheffield, and after an intentional walk, he got a 6-4-3 double play. Kevin Frandsen started it with a smooth pickup and feed.

I wrote about Frandsen’s debut in the team notebook. He seemed to play shortstop with a lot of confidence. As I mentioned in the notes, there’s a very good chance he’ll stay with the club after Juan Uribe returns from bereavement leave on Wednesday. (Especially after Eugenio Velez’s average fell to .111 and he failed to get down a sacrifice bunt in a rare start Sunday.)

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Brian Wilson’s mohawk is starting to fill out. I wonder if it’s causing any late redesigns of his bobblehead, which will be handed out July 12.

Sunday was Happy Lincecum Bobblehead Day. And it was insane. When I pulled into the parking lot a little before 2 p.m., there were already thousands of people lining up around the ballpark to make sure they’d get one.

I checked mine out. The likeness is OK. I’ve definitely seen worse. (Garret Anderson once took his home and his daughter said, “Daddy, why did they give you a goatee?” Then he realized, yeah, they sure did. And he’s never had a goatee.)

They got Timmy’s hair length right, but I noticed it’s got a little frizz to it.

Lincecum almost forgot to take his bobblehead home with him. He’ll probably have to stuff a few dozen into his equipment bag for friends and family while attending next weekend’s series at Seattle.

Thanks to Paul Kennedy, fine PR man for the Fresno Grizzlies, I have a Lincecum Grizzlies bobblehead on my shelf at home. Now that’s what you call a collector’s item. It’s not the pride and joy of my collection, though. That honor goes to my Tuffy Rhodes Kintentsu Buffaloes bobblehead, which a friend brought me from Japan. (The Teddy Roosevelt bobblehead from the Washington Nationals racing presidents series is also high on the list.)

It’s amazing how many giveaway bobbleheads I’ve picked up over the years. Probably close to 50. I paid for one, though: While in Milwaukee, I purchased the racing Bratwurst from the gift shop. Because I donned the Brat suit for a game in 2003, it’s the closest I’ll get to having a bobblehead that actually depicts me.

Andrew Baggarly

Andrew Baggarly has documented the most eventful era in San Francisco Giants baseball history, having covered the team since 2004 for th​ree major media outlets including the San Jose Mercury News and the Oakland Tribune​. This is his 20th season as a baseball writer.
​Baggarly is the author of the bestselling book, A Band of Misfits: Tales of the 2010 San Francisco Giants, and the newly published Giant Splash: Bondsian Blasts, World Series Parades and Other Thrilling Moments By the Bay. Baggarly’s other notable life accomplishments include running as the Bratwurst in the Milwaukee Sausage Race and becoming a three-time Jeopardy! champion.

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Why Andy, you were a sausage racer? So don’t leave us hanging, where did you finish?

Steve Phillips (on ESPN) picked up what Cain might have been doing to cause his pitches to miss high. Sure enough, after Rags came out the second time Matt’s pitches were down and he was mostly unhitable… And the correction made was what Phillips saw – Matt was forcing his pitches through with his hips causing his arm angle and release point out of whack.

Enjoy the day off…

Bob Bolobar

John Miller looked good but I wonder if he was happy with Joe Morgan and Steve Patterson’s gab fest over two innings dissing Carlos Beltran and other Mets while ignoring the game (and Giants).

Will

The best part about that was when they panned onto the commentators, you could see the other two blabbering away, while Jon Miller was peering through his binoculars trying to figure out who the heck replaced Alex Cora at SS.

Lance Newberry

Defense wins, and loses, games too.

The Giants have lost as many games from weak defense as they have by lack of offence, yet everyone is panicking for a hitter at any cost.

That was a nice play by Ishikawa on the double play.

fumble

Bob says:
“John Miller looked good but I wonder if he was happy with Joe Morgan and Steve Patterson’s gab fest over two innings dissing Carlos Beltran and other Mets while ignoring the game (and Giants).”
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That had to be the most boring job of announcing I’ve ever heard. Even Jon Miller looked like he was bored. I finally had to push mute — I couldn’t take it anymore.

HEADS UP

You guys are right about Mogan and Patterson’s complete disregard of the game. I had to mute the TV and turn on the radio!
I guess they think national tv means only the area from NY to Boston.

Gigantes

yeah morgan can’t shut up. He never talks about the game, just blabs on about other stuff. Kinda like Dick Vitale but he’s even worse. The playing references need to stop if it doesn’t pertain to the game at hand. Missed Kruk and Kuip, was soooo close to muting but I wanted to hear the crowd noise. If only we could just mute announcers.

Taggie

I’m glad I wasn’t the only one who was put off by the two knuckheads blabbing away about stuff only a Mets fan might be interested in. Fellas – check yourselves. There was an actual game going on – you know – on the field in front of you. If you want to talk fantasy baseball crap and cheesy insider gossip, go to the bar.

Stalky

Even losing 3 of 4 to the Metsies, I didn’t feel we got dominated by them. Clearly the Giants did it to themselves, but everyone stumbles, ‘cools off’, take your pick. We generated some runs in the first three and played our typical game in the last. Disappointing but not complete failures. Mets played like this in the previous series against the Braves.
Also, I’m starting to sour on Rowand. Two great opportunities, two small choppers to third this weekend. I don’t believe that players dog it or don’t try during a game (I think Manny only did that once to be fair) for the most part, but those efforts in those at-bats (first pitch swings!) gave me brief pause to consider that.

Johnny Mau

And here I thought I was the only one who thought the revered Morgan’s incessant yammering about “when I played the game” was a complete waste of time. I’m constantly irritated by his pining about his years with the Giants, when in reality, his fame came as a Cincinnati Red. And if Steve Phillips was such an expert, why isn’t he still a general manager? With the amount of misinformation that issues from that guy’s pie-hole I’m still wondering how he keeps a job. He gives TV sports journalism a bad name.

Nice job Baggs. How did you land the gig as the Sausage Racer? Big ups for that one.

I’m still not sold on Cain. It seems like every time I tune in when he is pitching he’s in trouble. Too much nibbling. Throw strikes already–Geez. I was in shock when Kuip announced that he went to 4-1. I think he got lucky, only that miserable strike zone was, admittedly, pretty hard to deal with.

I agree with previous comment–I really like Rowand and I want him to do well, but in the clutch, time after time, he is proving to be a liability.

peter

Steve and Joe were killing me with the “quality of edge” dialogue. I too had to mute the game. Too bad technology hasn’t reached the point where we can selectively mute announcers.

peter

As for Cain, ump would not call a high strike and Cain lives up there.

Frank

Yeah, the announcers spent several innings talking about nothing but the Mets. The one time they did mention the Giants, Morgan said the Giants would be screwed without Molina. That took about a minute, and that was about all we got to hear about the Giants. It was like listening to the Mets broadcast team. Oh well, the Eastcoast Sports Programming Network never fails. It was so satisfying to see the Giants win the game after so much Mets talk.

Zo

Same experience – I tuned in just in time to see Frandsen make an excellent short hop grounder play, heard about the Met’s leadership, and turned on the radio. Met’s leadership, who cares?

A note about “Tennessee Stud”, though – written by Jimmy Driftwood, recorded by (in addition to Johnny Cash) Doc Watson, Eddy Arnold and Tennessee Ernie Ford. Seems like a little more impressive nickname than “Big Sugar.”

jct

Tennessee Bulldog? <.<

David

Great to see Cain get a win over the Mets after 4 straight losses. Hope he gets the recognition this year, he deserves it. Kudos to Affeldt’s relief work during the series. He looks like a good pickup, as opposed to Howry, who looks like he may be done after being overused in Chicago. Thanks for the updates Andrew.

Ryan

Who is Steve Patterson?

bandwagon

The nickname is lame.

Mo

Nickname is lame, Cain is the ace of the staff this year. Sanchez & Randy have to pitch better than they have b/c Mad Bum is blowing up AA and could be fast tracked to the bigs later in the year…

nostocksjustbonds

how about “The Germantown Giant”?

Jacob Wang

Zito v. Gaudin on Wednesday? Somebody get Billy Beane a TV!

Eddie Gaedel

Tennessee Stud is a great nickname. Maybe people aren’t ready to refer to Cain as a stud just yet. That and he needs a tanning booth before he becomes the color of the sun. Baggs has already let us know his eyes are green. Cain seems like the type that hasn’t had anything more than a farmers tan at any point in his life.

bseismic

I am amazed at some of the comments questioning Cain’s abilities. When he leaves SF and is successful (on a team that actually scores runs) the comments will be, “Why didn’t he do that here?”

I used to like Joe Morgan… but I’ll take him over that a-hole on Fox.

George

The Tennessee Stud is a great nickname, though I wouldn’t call Cain “long and lean”.

Steve in Montana

Stalky, you wanna talk about Rowand! What about Lewis?! 2 balls that he should have gotten to made it to the fence! He looked like he was dogging it! I’m getting pretty fed up with his play too! Somebody better give him a swift kick and get his head back in the game!

I have to say that I enjoy listening to Morgan. He’s very intelligent and knows a lot about the game. He always has great tid-bits on past and present players and games. I never get tired of listening to him.

It was so great to see Matt win that game. I don’t think I’ve ever cursed a player more, yet turn right around and praise a player more, well except for Robb!

Youre so cool! I dont suppose Ive learn something like this before. So good to search out someone with some original thoughts on this subject. realy thanks for starting this up. this website is one thing that is wanted on the web, somebody with just a little originality. useful job for bringing one thing new to the internet!